1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN) network sharing data transmission/reception method and apparatus in a Wi-Fi Peer-to-Peer (P2P) group. More particularly, the present invention relates to a WLAN network sharing data transmission/reception method and apparatus for facilitating establishment of a radio channel for data transmission by assigning relatively a high priority to the WLAN network sharing data of a Wi-Fi P2P group.
2. Description of the Related Art
With the rapid advancements in information and semiconductor technologies, there has been a phenomenal growth in the use and popularity of mobile devices. Recent mobile devices are not just basic devices for providing dedicated services but are multifunctional devices supporting converged functions and services. As one of the representative mobile devices, the mobile communication terminal incorporates diverse supplementary functions including a TeleVision (TV) function, (e.g., Digital Multimedia Broadcasting (DMB) and Digital Video Broadcasting (DVB)), an audio playback function (e.g. Moving Picture Experts Group (MPEG)-1 or MPEG-2 Audio Layer-3 (MP3)), a camera function, a data communication function, an Internet access function, and a Wi-Fi function, as well as the basic voice communication and messaging functions. Wi-Fi is the function supporting Internet access service via an Access Point (AP). Recently, Wi-Fi Peer-to-Peer (P2P) connection technology draws attention as a new approach to establish wireless connection between two terminals equipped with Wi-Fi interfaces. The Wi-Fi P2P technology is similar to other short range wireless communication technologies such as Bluetooth, ZigBee, and Infrared Data Association (IrDA). However, Wi-Fi P2P is drawing attention as the substitute of other short range wireless communication technologies due to the advantages in security, power consumption, data rate, communication range, etc.
The Wi-Fi P2P technology can establish a Wi-Fi P2P group in the form of 1:1 or 1:multiple connection. At this time, a mobile station operates as a group owner and the other mobile stations operate as clients. The group owner is capable of establishing the P2P connection with the clients and the Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN) connection with the AP simultaneously. That is, the group owner acts as the AP to the P2P clients and as a mobile station to the WLAN AP. In this case, the radio channel between the WLAN AP and the P2P group owner and the radio channel between the P2P group owner and P2P client for Wi-Fi P2P network communication are identical with each other.
Meanwhile, the Wi-Fi P2P Media Access Control (MAC) protocol uses a contention-based radio channel access for data transmission. That is, the mobile stations contend for the radio channel based on a Carrier Sense Multiple Access with Collision Avoidance (CSMA/CA) protocol.
Accordingly, when a P2P client attempts to transmit data via a WLAN AP in the Wi-Fi P2P communication of the related art, the P2P client has to contend for the radio channel to the P2P owner and the P2P owner has to contend for the radio channel to the WLAN AP. Similarly, the Wi-Fi P2P communication of the related art requires the P2P client to perform contention twice to receive via the WLAN AP. Having to perform contention twice for the radio channel degrades the data rate, resulting in a user's inconvenience. More particularly, in a case of receiving a service sensitive to the Quality of Service (QoS), such as a voice and real-time video transmission, the user's dissatisfaction is likely to be even worse. Such dissatisfaction is likely to reflect on the devices, resulting in a bad impression of the devices. There is therefore a need for a method for reducing contention delay for transmitting/receiving the WLAN network sharing data in the Wi-Fi P2P group.